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I have Jakob Nielsen's "Designing Web Usability" [ISBN 1-56205-810-x] and Alan Cooper's "The Inmates are Running the Asylum" [ISBN 0-672-31649-8] in my bookcase. Please, don't use either of them as "the only way to do things."
Get involved in the design meetings when these things are decided. Listen to the requirements as they are explained and use the above resources to think critically about them.
Good luck. Sounds like a great opportunity!
Paul Hanson
Technical Writer
Quintrex Data Systems http://www.quintrex.com
email: phanson at quintrex.com
-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+phanson=quintrex -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com [mailto:techwr-l-bounces+phanson=quintrex -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf Of Leisa Ashbaugh
Sent: Tuesday, September 29, 2009 4:15 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: How to become a UI design expert? Fast!
<snip>
I am looking for resources that can help take me beyond my current view of UI design - which comes from the 'after it's done and I have to document it' 'why didn't they do X, Y or Z?' perspective - to a more informed 'design from scratch' approach. I would like to able to give informed, well-researched onions and answer questions like: what's our metaphor? Should we use menu items, buttons or both? Why or why not? What about tabs? Rather than defaulting to the "good design....ah....I know it when I see it" position.
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Free Software Documentation Project Web Cast: Covers developing Table of
Contents, Context IDs, and Index, as well as Doc-To-Help
2009 tips, tricks, and best practices. http://www.doctohelp.com/SuperPages/Webcasts/
Help & Manual 5: The complete help authoring tool for individual
authors and teams. Professional power, intuitive interface. Write
once, publish to 8 formats. Multi-user authoring and version control! http://www.helpandmanual.com/
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